Bombay East Indians

It happened to be the day of a Parsee festival.

These descendants of the sect of Zoraster--the most thrifty, civilised, intelligent, and austere of the East Indians, among whom are counted the richest native merchants of Bombay--were celebrating a sort of religious carnival, with processions and shows, in the midst of which Indian dancing-girls, clothed in rose -coloured gauze, looped up with gold and silver, danced airily, but with perfect modesty, to the sound of viols and the clanging of tambourines.

It is needless to say that Passepartout watched these curious ceremonies with staring eyes and gaping mouth, and that his countenance was that of the greenest booby imaginable.

Unhappily for his master, as well as himself, his curiosity drew him unconsciously farther off than he intended to go.